Gail Godwin is the bestselling author of more than twenty critically acclaimed books, including the memoir Getting to Know Death, and the novels Grief Cottage, Grief Cottage, Evensong, and A Mother and Two Daughters. She has received a Guggenheim Fellowship, National Endowment for the Arts grants for both fiction and libretto writing, and the Award in Literature from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. She lives in Woodstock, New York. www.gailgodwin.com

"Insightful, sharp and self-deprecating... The passage of time has done little to diminish the clarity and warmth of Godwin's prose; reading her is like spending time with a wise and dear friend who will always listen to you, level with you, and tell you how the world works without making you despair... Even at this late stage in her life, Gail Godwin remains curious about what she can become, about her own agency and capacity for hope, and she shows us what it means to be fully engaged with life." --California Review of Books

"Written with the usual clarity and honesty of this exemplary writer." --Library Journal

"Godwin's wide-lens perspective, and her discussion of coping with uncertainty by meditating on psalms and supporting the distribution of banned books, offers a road map for readers horrified by the state of the world. It's a balm." --Publishers Weekly

"Godwin ponders the current vulnerability of democracy and the necessity of dissent along with the 'hypersonic speed' of history-in-the-making and the need to live as attentively and ethically as one can." --Booklist

"Gail and I were beginning writers and Kurt Vonnegut's students when we first met. In this insightful memoir, the past and present are as purposely interwoven as the plot of a good novel. A most relevant political history is entwined with Trump's 2024 re-election and the debacle he's made of our beloved democracy. This book is about being a vigilant citizen." --John Irving

Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing

Pub date: 2026-06-09

Length: 224 pages